Illinois man brings crosses to Las Vegas to honor shooting victims

Fifty-eight white crosses for the victims of Sunday night's mass shooting stand on the south end of the Las Vegas Strip. They were built by Greg Zanis, a retired carpenter from the Chicago suburbs.(Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Drew Angerer/Getty Images

LAS VEGAS — An Illinois man known for honoring the victims of mass shootings around the country brought 58 crosses to the Las Vegas Strip to honor the victims of last weekend’s shooting, WGN reported.

>> Read more trending newsGreg Zanis, 66, a retired carpenter from the Chicago suburb of Aurora, made the 58 crosses for the victims and placed them in front of the Welcome to Las Vegas sign, KABC reported.He previously made crosses for the Pulse Nightclub shooting victims in Orlando, Florida, and for gun violence victims in Chicago. He also erected crosses after the Columbine and Sandy Hook school shootings. He has built more than 20,000 crosses in 20 years.

Each cross had a heart attached, and Zanis also brought Stars of David for Jewish victims. He wrote the names and glued pictures of the victims on each one when available, WGN reported.Zanis said he sympathizes with the families of the victims because recalls the pain of personal tragedy, KABC reported. His father-in-law was murdered 20 years ago.

"That just changed my life," Zanis told The New York Times. "My first cross was for somebody that I loved. And when I put up these crosses here, I always think of my personal loss here too. Always."

Barbecue restaurant that moved ‘home’ to replace Fairfield tavern in 2016 has closed

Fairfield High School graduate Andy Castle recently opened Butt Shack BBQ & Grill at 500 Wessel Drive in Fairfield, the former site of Symmes Tavern on the Green.

FAIRFIELD — A Butler County restaurant that touted its “low and slow” wood-smoked barbecue has closed.

Butt Shack BBQ & Grill, 500 Wessel Drive in Fairfield, shut its doors earlier this month. The restaurant took its name from the shoulder of a pig, referred to as Boston butt or pork butt.

Andy Castle, a 1995 Fairfield High School graduate, started Butt Shack in Hamilton County’s New Baltimore in 2012, then moved to Greenhills in 2013 and Fairfield in late 2016, replacing Symmes Tavern, which closed a few months earlier.

“The opportunity to move our low and slow smoked BBQ restaurant from Greenhills to our hometown in Fairfield was a dream come true, which makes today bittersweet,” Castle said in a message posted to the restaurant’s website and its Facebook page. “With a heavy heart, we sadly announce that Butt Shack BBQ & Grill is closed. We’d like to thank our staff, our family and countless others that supported us. It’s been our pleasure to serve this community.”

We reached out to Castle to ask why he shut down the restaurant but have not yet received a response.

Nick Murphy was one of those people, until he began to renovate his parents' home in Winthrop and found glimpses to the past hiding in the ceiling.

Some of the items Murphy found included door hinges, a comb and personal items such as letters and a dance card.

"I started pulling the ceiling down and I noticed newspaper clippings coming down with it," said Murphy.

One of the items, a dance card, was written out when Chester Arthur was president of the United States.

"1884, this was held by somebody who was actually going to attend a ball," said Murphy.

Another letter, decades apart from the dance card, was written in 1942 and details the interactions between a brother and a sister.

"That letter is from the World War II era and it’s between a brother and a sister," said Murphy. The sister's name is Edith and that's who it is addressed to. It’s talking about getting Edith out of WW2 and out of the navy and it talks about the impending surrender of the Germans and the Japanese."

Murphy says he doesn't know if these items belonged to people who once lived in his parents' home, but know these items all come with a story that he hopes will live on.

"For us, it’s this preserved piece of history, but for them it was their actual day to day life - it was just interesting to find it," said Murphy.

Murphy says that after he's done with renovating the room, his next project will be to frame up all those items and hang them on the walls of that room as a tribute.

Fifth woman from similar background is missing from Middletown

MIDDLETOWN — Middletown police are continuing to look for Julie Kakaris, who told her father via phone messages that she was being held against her will.

Officers were called to the residence of Kakaris’ father on Tuesday afternoon on a report that she was possibly being held against her will at an apartment complex.

Paul Bilunka said he received messages from his daughter last Monday that two to three men were holding her in an apartment and forcing her to do drugs, according to the police report. She asked him to pick her up because she was scared, but in a later conversation she asked him not to do so.

Officers checked possible locations for Kakaris on Tuesday and have been checkout leads ever since, according to Major Scott Reeve.

“We have knocked on doors and talked to people, but we haven’t found her,” Reeve said. “We are concerned.”

Four other women with similar backgrounds remain missing from Middletown. The police department has enlisted the help the the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation to locate the women or leads on their whereabouts.

Reeve said all the women are adults with a history of drug abuse, and some were homeless and had a history of prostitution.

Detectives said it is possible English’s disappearance could be related to Lindsay Bogan, who went missing from Middletown two years ago and whose skeletal remains were found more than a year ago in a field on a Madison Twp. farm. Her death remains unsolved.

English made it known to others she was helping police in their investigation of Bogan’s death, police told this news outlet in 2016. There have been no sightings of English since her disappearance.

— Three local barbecue purveyors — one a restaurant, one that focuses on catering special events, and one a mail-order barbecue-sauce-and-rubs company founded by a local restaurant chef — collected some impressive hardware and awards at the National Barbecue & Grilling Association 2018 Awards of Excellence announced late last week and over the weekend.

Company 7 BBQ in Englewood captured 1st place in the all-purpose beef rub category for its “Rescue Rub.” The category drew 45 entries from throughout the country.

UrbanQ Smokehouse, a Waynesville-based mail-order company in its first year that sells sauces and rubs to backyard barbecue enthusiasts, won a first-place “People’s choice” award for its Smokehouse Blues BBQ sauce. It also placed third in the “Fruit-Based Sauce” category for its Smokehouse Blues sauce, and sixth in the beef-rub category for its “It’s All About the Meats & More” seasoning.

UrbanQ Smokehouse was founded in recent months by Chris Cavender and his family. Cavender oversees 1572 Roadhouse Bar-B-Q on the grounds of the Ohio Renaissance Festival near Waynesville. For more information or to shop for rubs and sauces, go www.urbanqsmokehouse.com.

Historic BBQ based in Lebanon captured second place for “Best Label” for its BBQ Sweet Zing, and fifth place in the fruit-based sauce category for the same Sweet Zing sauce, and it also captured third place in the “Tomato/Spicy” sauce category for its Historic BBQ Spicy sauce.

“Rescue Rub is one of our best secrets — we use it in almost all our dishes,” said Mary Grilliot, co-founder of Company 7. “It works well with pork, chicken, turkey, fish, almost any meat. It is equally delicious on sides, eggs, gravies — again almost anything and you can buy Rescue Rub for your use at home. HOWEVER, one word of caution: Rescue Rub is very powerful, so start seasoning with a restrained hand. One bottle of Rescue Rub will last you a long time, even though you will find yourself using it on most dishes.”